To The Person Who Left ONE Gummy Bear in the Candy Dish

(And I know who you are!)

Not eating ALL the gummy bears does not negate your glutonous consumption of the other 99.9999% of the department refreshments.

Making Insomnia Work for You

I mean, if you can't sleep at 5 am, might as well go to the gym, right?

Tip: You're an idiot of you think you aren't going to need a shower after running 2 miles. Bring a towel.

Exactly why I hate supervising on "college night"

AnnoyingNewbieGirl: I can't seem to get this move.
AnnoyingNewbieBoy: That's because you're too short! It's totally a route for us tall people.
Me: (rage bubbling over because ANG doesn't deserve that kind of crap) Um, Beth Rodden is only 5'1".
ANB: Is she, like, some pro climber?
Me: Uh, yeah. She like totally made the 2nd free ascent of The Nose.
ANB: (who has ZERO idea what he's talking about, but am guessing he thinks "free climbing" means not in the gym?) Yeah, well free climbing is easier 'cuz you can use whatever holds you want.
Me: (All restraint GONE.) Actually, at 5.13 I wouldn't call it "easier"
ANB: *walks away*

Now maybe I'm just old and crotchety (*smirk*) but I can NOT stand these kids, who haven't ever been beyond the YMCA rock gym, telling me what's what. Especially when it's 9.27 and I want to close at 9.30 but people are still dicking around on their "projects".

From the "Not so much annoying as potentially dangerous" Files:
Basically Nice Kid Who Doesn't Have Much Experience But Apparently Thinks He Does: Are there lead routes at Metro Rock?
Me: Yup. There's a bunch. (incredulously) Do you lead?
BNKWDHMEBATHD: Well, no. But I have quickdraws.

Earhole-itis

Here's one for the "bizarre medical issues" file:

My weird ear ringing/dizzy spells have continued since the first onslaught after Christmas. It's nowhere near as bad, but kind of annoying. So, I made a doctor's appointment, you know, just to see if it was anything or if I was just crazy.

The doctor did a bunch of bizarre tests involving me sitting up, lying down, moving my head, closing my eyes, walking in a straight line. She was trying to bring on the dizzyness. (Oh, it had already been brought!) No luck. Looking in my ears didn't show anything amiss. She assured me I wasn't crazy or delusional and what was probably wrong with me was something called Labyrinthitis.

No, really. Apparently David Bowie is fucking with my inner ear. Jerk.

The best part? It will most likely go away on its own IN A COUPLE OF MONTHS.

Now I Can Get Back to Worrying About What's Really Important

Namely, my hair.

Yes, the hair is back. After my last hair disaster, I decided to go see the experts: The Russians.

I see Sveta every couple of months for a bikini wax and figured anyone that expert and adept at ripping hair off my crotch must know where to get a decent haircut. Luckily, the spa is a full service facility for all types of hair, and I got an appointment with Mary for a cut and color.

I'm not going to mince words here: She gave me the best haircut EVER. Seriously, ever. It's ironic that someone who's first language is NOT Enlgish, and who learned to speak it mostly by watching Oprah (from what I can gather), was able to understand EXACTLY what I wanted done. The haircut has met and exceeded all of my expectations. It's totally perfect.

And also purple.

Knowledge is obsession

While I was at work today, I started looking up the calories in various foods. I do this periodically to freak myself out. Like reading about Morgellon's Disease. Shock therapy or something. Anyway, I set up one of those accounts where you log everything you eat and it tells you how many calories, fat, etc. you had. It also gives you an overall grade for your food for the day. I got a C+. And that's not counting the glass of wine I'm drinking right now.

I was a little feaked out when I saw how much I had consumed. I mean, it wasn't ridiculous, and I think some of the portions are off, but damn. Part of this I have to blame on the chick who made my coffee at Starbucks this morning. I ordered a cappuccino and she gave me a LATTE. I didn't realize it until I got to work and took a sip and I wasn't about to drive back and demand a new coffee. I was already 15 minutes late as it was. That bitch cost me FIFTY CALORIES!

Braveheart Syndrome

Tonight, I had what is hands down the best run of my life. And by best I mean, I didn't feel like I was going to die after 5 minutes and for a good portion of it, I didn't hate running.

It's so totally the iPod.

I put a bunch of new music on there yesterday in the hopes that it would stop playing Leadbelly so freaking much. It worked. Kinda. Leadbelly has been replaced by Mambo Cubano! which makes me want to swivel my hips and beat some timbales. Hard to do while running. Especially for someone who's equilibrium is not 100% reliable.

The best part came when I was running through the parking lot of The Big Lie and some rousing Celtic anthem came on. I think it may have been something by Old Blind Dogs. I immediately picked up my pace and charged across the moor, Claymore brandished high vowing to overthrow the Hanovarians/British/Protestants! I was Bonnie Prince Charlie! I was Michael Collins! I was Braveheart without the anti-semitism!

And then I was Tito Puente.

2007: The year of the wing.

I'm still wondering how the holidays and a whole year managed to slip by without me realizing it. All I realized is that I am old and lame and went to bed at 12:02 the other night.

I hosted a family party (and I dipped no one's hand in a jar of acid) on New Year's Eve. I don't know what I was thinking when I agreed to that, but it certainly wasn't "I hope that every chicken wing in the world makes its way to my house." Luckily my brother invited a bunch of his friends over and force fed them wings. I don't even like wings, and I especially don't like finding them in drawers, behind furniture and under the dishwasher. (I just discovered an ENTIRE TRAY of uncooked wings chilling on my back porch. Ahhahahahahah.) I declare 2007 to be the year of the Wing.

I think the best part of deciding to have this party (which actually turned out all right, all wings considered) was getting sick the Wednesday after Christmas and lazing about in bed until Sunday when I organized a frantic oh my god people can NOT see how I live, must scrape pigeon shit off the stairs, who's idea was it to make wings anyway, cleaning binge.

I don't know what was/is wrong with me, but signs point to something fucked up with my ears, because i spent most of last week without equilibrium and being unable to move my head without feeling like I was going to throw up and walking into more things than usual. I'm getting used to the constant ringing in my ears and really, who needs to move their head anyway? (It's kind of like being drunk and having the room spin, except I did not have the pleasure of getting drunk.) My doctor is on vacation until Jan. 7, so I did not seek medical attention and instead drank 24 cans of Diet Ginger Ale.

My fitness/diet (ha!) regimine has been seriously thrown off by the holidays and the swimmy head business, but I tried to recoup my losses (or more accurately, my gains) and hit the gym. I must say that the iPod Shuffle (aka the musical postage stamp) was particularly kind to me tonight and played songs I actually wanted to hear. I don't know where the Shuffle gets off claiming to play a random assortment of your music library because it clearly does not. No, my workout is soundtracked by the whims of a tiny silver dictator. And for some reason, it LOVES Leadbelly, which is all well and good, but he makes me want to kill myself rather than run another 20 minutes. Also, there are songs that I am convinced I am NEVER GOING TO HEAR because we need to play Coin Operated Boy 4 times in 20 minutes.

In speaking of dictators, I must confess that when the news revealed that Saddam Hussein had been executed I immediately went online to try and see the footage. I sort of hate myself for watching this, but I simply couldn't NOT watch. Luckily the video (clearly taken with someone's camera phone) was shakey and of poor quality, but still, it was pretty horrific. I found it a bit absurd that the media was all concerned about showing/not showing the execution when OBVIOUSLY it was going to be put on the internet 5 minutes after the event? I should totally be reading F. Scott Fitzgerald or something instead of watching this kind of stuff.